World Made by Hand

Fifty-nine

Loren was in a lot of pain as we made our way down the road. He groaned continually and now and again cried out and cursed. I propped him up as best I could, but he stumbled several times. He said he could feel blood running down his legs. It seemed to take forever to get to the old bridge over Black Creek. We agreed to stop there. A path well trodden by fishermen led from the road down to the bank. The moon, now clear of the treetops, cast enough light to see by. I helped Loren down the path. The stream had a gravel bed, and there was a little beach beside a pool on the upstream side of the bridge. I left Loren there so he could drink some water while I went to wash the filth off myself downstream. The creek was no more than knee deep and quite chilly. I scrubbed as much as I could without soap and soaked my head, but the stench stayed with me. Then I went back to help Loren wash off. Finally I helped him struggle out of the water.

“I can’t walk… the rest of the way,” he said. He was breathing in gasps. “You’re going to have to… send somebody up to get me in a… a wagon or something. Let’s not even… argue about it.”

“All right. Hold still a moment.”

I hitched up a leg of his pants. The moonlight did not pick up color very well, but I could see a rivulet of something darker than water run down his leg.

“How am I… doing?”

“I think you’re still bleeding some.”

“I think so too. Before you go… get me a good stick. For the coyotes.”

“All right.”

I found him something like a war club. He said he didn’t want to sit, it hurt too much, so I helped him creep over to a clump of alders he could hold onto and sort of lean on. I assured him I’d be back soon and left him there by the bridge in the moonlight. I doubted anyone from Karptown would come looking for us again. They’d had all the fun and excitement they needed.

It had been a long time since I ran any distance, but I jogged most of the way back to town. Much of it was downhill. I went directly to the high school and banged on the door at the front entrance, which was locked, naturally. I knew they ran regular watches around the building. In a little while, one of the brothers appeared. I didn’t know this one’s name, but he seemed to recognize me. He let me in. I asked him to get Joseph. He went directly. Two minutes later, Joseph strode down the hallway, lifting a suspender into place, with Elam right behind buttoning his shirt as he walked. I told them what had happened to Loren and me up at Karptown. Joseph said Brother Jobe had left him with instructions to help if I called upon him. I told him to get somebody over to Doctor Copeland’s, tell him to have his wife prepare for surgery, have her fetch Bobbie Deland over to assist, and for Jerry to report here to the school with his wagon as soon as possible, to get Loren down.

Joseph turned to Elam. “Send Brother Jonah to get the doc,” he said. “You go get Minor, Seth, Caleb, and Lazarus to tack up all the horses that are fit to ride and harness a rig. I’ll get the rest of the men up. Let’s all meet out front in half an hour.”

Elam took off at a trot. I begged Joseph to take me to a shower and bring me some fresh clothes, including a pair of size-ten boots, if they could spare any. He showed me to the shower in the boys’ locker room and then went to get the clothes. I’d last been in the locker room when Daniel was on the soccer team. Being there gave me another reason to rue and wonder at the strangeness of how our lives had gone in this century. The shower was warm but not hot. They had a wood-burning boiler up on the roof rigged up to the plumbing system. But they fired it only at breakfast and suppertime. Anyway, it was good enough. They had plenty of sharp lye soap on hand. I scrubbed my scalp raw. Joseph soon returned with some clothing and a towel. Also a bottle of whiskey.

“I thought maybe you’d like to wash your mouth out,” he said. “And knock some back to ease your mind.”

“Most considerate of you,” I said and did exactly that. He’d brought me a good muslin shirt and dark linen pants, a pair of suspenders. They fit well enough. The boots were nicely broken-in.

“They’re Brother Jobe’s boots,” he said.

“Imagine that.”

We talked over a plan as I dressed. The objective was simple: to extract Wayne Karp and bring him to jail. I described the layout of Karptown, the location of Wayne’s place inside it, and so forth. I knew Joseph was capable of accomplishing this. But I was worried he might take things too far.

“You are not to kill this man,” I said. “Whatever he has done, he is going to answer in a court of law.”

“Eventually he’ll answer to something higher.”

“I’m just asking you not to hasten that moment.”

“Okay, sir.”

“Nor kill anyone else up there if you can avoid it.”

“I’ll take care.”

“This can’t turn into an Indian war kind of thing where one raid leads back and forth to another and another.”

“I understand.”

“And don’t burn the place down, either. Most of the people up there aren’t guilty of anything.”

“Of course.”

“I’ll be going with you as far as the Black Creek Bridge. We’ll stop there and get Reverend Holder into Doc Copeland’s rig. I’ll accompany them back to the doctor’s place while you and your men get Karp. I will meet you back at the jail, with your prisoner, somewhere between three and four in the morning.”

“Okay on that, sir.”

“How many men in all are you going to take?”

“We have twenty horses all told. Minus the rig. Minus a horse for you. Minus any horses unfit to ride tonight. Maybe fifteen, seventeen men.”

“Is it enough?”

“Any more than that, you just increase the chance for something to go wrong.”

I followed Joseph to what proved to be the men’s quarters, along the far wing of the school, away from the gym wing. The brothers slept five or more to the classroom there, like a dormitory. We went through them with a lantern as Joseph handpicked the brothers best suited to this venture, the most experienced, boldest.

In a little while, we all began to marshal out in front of the school. The moon was at its zenith and the clear sky blazed with stars. Minor, Elam, and the others led a string of horses down from the pasture, along with a utility cart. Minor seemed in especially high spirits.

“Good to see you again, sir,” Minor said. “Tell me: how do you stop a rooster from crowing on Sunday?”

“I don’t know. How?”

“Fricassee him on Saturday.”

A moment later, Jerry Copeland pulled in the high school drive in his rig, a two-wheeled box cart behind a Morgan horse named Buddy, with Brother Jonah in the seat beside him. He trotted up past the gardens to the school’s entrance. Jonah jumped out as I hurried over. In the box behind the seat was a stretcher on an old mattress.

“What’s this all about, Robert,” Jerry said.

I told him what happened to Loren up in Karptown. By the strenuous way Jerry rubbed his eyes I knew that he was extremely concerned.

“What are you thinking?” I said.

“I’m thinking I hope the bastards didn’t rip anything up in the peritoneal cavity. I don’t have any antibiotics, Robert. You get a bunch of shit in there it’s not good news.”

Just then, Elam came to notify me they were ready to ride and had my old mount, Cadmus, saddled up for me. I went with Elam and climbed aboard.

“I’m hereby deputizing all of you, limited to this operation tonight,” I said and turned things over to Joseph to explain what I’d outlined previously to him about bringing Wayne Karp back alive and not harming any innocent people. Then we trotted off under the stars.